Insecurity
by IronAmerica
Summary: We wear the mask that grins and lies; it hides our face and shields our eyes - Paul Laurence Dunbar.  A quick peek beneath the masks of Palm City's heroes and villains at their most vulnerable moments.  Contains spoilers for most episodes of the Cape.
1. Scales

Un-beta'ed; all mistakes are my own.

Please read the following warning before you read this chapter:

**This chapter contains alcohol abuse and implied and non-graphic child-abuse. I apologize in advance for any trauma I may inadvertently cause readers of this chapter-but if you ignore this warning and keep reading, it will be your own fault. **

**_CONSIDER YOURSELF FOREWARNED. _**

- o - o -

Insecurity

Scales: Reminiscence

Scales can barely remember returning to his warehouse in the wake of the fiasco on the Monte Carlo train. The smuggler is still caught up between two of the worst events of the week: making a fool of himself in front of Palm City's most influential citizens, and being locked in a cage.

Making a fool of himself in front of so many people is the lesser of two evils, however. He can easily recoup the loss of face in a fortnight if he plays his cards correctly. But the second disastrous occurrence of the evening, though, is something that he'd never forgive himself for.

If he'd been just a bit smarter, he might have seen the Cape's freaky friends on the train. It's obvious, to Scales, that the entire evening had been a set-up by the cape-wearing bastard from the start.

The smuggler methodically stripped his suit off, and throws it in the general direction of the hamper. That done, he yanks open the top drawer of his bureau with a little more force than is necessary and pulls an unopened bottle of vodka out.

He was going to get completely pissed up in an attempt to forget that the evening have happened at all.

The first shot goes down with a horrendous burn.

"_Get in that cage boy!"_

_The whip crack isn't unexpected, and Dominic screams out of habit. The pain became bearable months ago. The eight-year-old still refuses to move, even when the whip slashes across his cheek._

The second shot burns as well, but Scales shakes it off. His hands are trembling as he lifts the glass to his lips, and it's all he can do not to spill any of the vodka.

"_Your place is in that cage," the man snarls. His hand raises up and Dominic can see the glint of brass knuckles._

_The twelve-year-old can't even bring himself to care when he flies backwards after being struck. He's refused to move again, trying to stay out of the cage for just a few minutes longer. Dominic wasn't quite the rebellious teen, but he was fairly sure he was as close to stereotype as he could get._

Scales abandons the glass and drinks straight from the bottle. Some of the vodka spills over his chin, mixing with some of the first tears the smuggler has shed in decades. He can't bring himself to care.

_The people are laughing at him, jeering, calling him a freak. Dominic curls up tighter, willing the world to fade away again. It's the fifth such show he's endured this week, and each time it gets harder to block out the jeering and the thinly-veiled contempt._

_The whip snakes through the bars again, jerking the fourteen-year-old out of his daze. The people outside the cage laugh again, moving on to see what else the show has to offer. Dominic watches them go, wishing that they'd realize it wasn't a game. _

_The pain is worse when they don't realize what's happening._

Scales lifts the bottles to his lips again, downing even more of the potent alcohol. His hands have stopped shaking, and he's not so sure that's a good thing but keeps drinking anyway.

"_Where do you think you're going boy?"_

_Dominic ignores the question, and continues his trek towards the fairground entrance. There's an entire city to get lost in if he can keep his resolve up. He's nineteen now, and this is the first city he's been in, in years. MacClintock is behind him, and Dominic hears the tell-tale whistle of the whip before it wraps around his throat._

"_I said, where do you think you're going, boy?" MacClintock hisses again, pulling the bullwhip tighter. Dominic sees the spots in front of his eyes, can hear the drunkard's heavy breathing in his ear, and he snaps._

_The first blow is for his lost childhood. The second blow is for his suffering. Number three is for the pain of humiliation; four and five are for lost dreams and hopes. Six and seven are for his broken bones and being locked in a cage for imagined slights. Eight through ten are for years spent in misery, wishing for a reprieve that would never come from the man underneath him._

_His hands are bloody now, and all Dominic can think of is victory. He leaves the man—the man who terrified and threatened him as a child—bleeding and whimpering on the ground._

_Dominic doesn't look back._

Scales feels someone gently pulling the bottle of vodka out of his grasp and makes a weak attempt to get it back. His hands fall short, and he swears at the person. The hands are back, urging him to get up and moving him in the direction of his bed.

Scales can just barely make out what they're saying, but it sounds soothing and he's too drunk to care…or to want to. He falls heavily into bed and is unconscious before his head hits the pillow.

- o – o -

Kazzie returns to the main warehouse, muttering under his breath about idiotic employers. He catches the eye of Noodle, Trevor, Mikey (and when did he get in, Kazzie wonders), and the two drivers. He scowls when he sees money exchange hands.

"Keep this to yourselves," he snarls, stalking up to his cohorts. "Or the boss will have to find what's left of you with a microscope and a pair of tweezers."

And because Kazzie is their unofficial leader, they listen.

- - o - - o - -

Author's note: This isn't the sequel to The Holiday Season that I've been promising my two loyal minions. Don't worry, I'm still working on it. This just demanded more of my attention.


	2. Dana

Hey, it's an update, almost a year later!

Un-beta'ed.

- o – o -

Dana: Heartbreak

Dana turned the radio on, trying to find something that would drown out the people outside her office. Ever since word had gotten out that "Chess' Widow" was working at the Public Defender's Office, she hadn't gotten a moments peace. The reporters seemed to be more interested in her than anything else, and they just. Wouldn't. Stop.

"_Because you live and breathe—"_ Dana switched the station almost automatically. She _didn't_ need to hear that today. The lawyer glowered at the closed door of her office and heard the quiet clicking of cameras. She buried her face in her hands, taking deep breaths as she tried to control the urge to tell all of the reporters camping out in front of her door to go jump off a cliff.

"_Time af—_" _Definitely_ not. The public defender glowered at her radio, wondering if every DJ in the city was just trying to piss her off. Vince had loved that song, simply because it drove her spare. He'd played it constantly when they were first dating… Dana sighed and swallowed, eyes closed to hold back tears. She'd stop complaining about the song if she could just have Vince back.

Half an hour later, Dana braved the corridor outside her office to get something to drink. The reporters seemed to have thinned down some, which was a relief. Her break from being hounded by the media was short-lived, though, as one of them caught sight of her.

Running in heels was a skill to be admired. Dana pelted for the safety of her office. Once there, she leaned against the door and slid down it, sobbing aloud. _Why couldn't they just leave her alone?_ Hadn't she suffered enough already? Her husband was dead, her son had horrendous nightmares every night, and she was running on pure caffeine because she couldn't sleep either.

Every time she woke up in the dark, she prayed that the explosion had just been some horrible dream. And then she rolled over and found that the other side of the bed was cold and Vince's pillow had no indentation in it. The tears would start all over again, and she'd be unable to go back to sleep for the rest of the night.

The public defender pulled herself up, using the door to help her stand. There was no use crying right now, not when she had work to do. And… Getting this job had been a miracle that she'd needed. Badly. Although she'd never admit it to Travis, she could have kissed him for giving her a job. Even the firm she'd worked at before Trip had been born, before she'd taken time off to raise her son, hadn't given her a job. Apparently a good lawyer wasn't worth the publicity that came from hiring "Chess' Widow".

Dana sighed and looked at her radio in apprehension. It wasn't like anything _else_ could go wrong, could it? She turned it on and swore into her hands as the radio began playing Here Without You.

She gave in and left the radio playing, opting to bury her face in her arms as she cried. Some days, the stress of losing Vince and watching her son drift away were more than she could handle. Even work wasn't doing anything to distract her—there was too much of a routine in the cases already, and routines allowed her mind to wander.

A quiet knock on her door had Dana looking up. She scrubbed uselessly at her eyes, smudging her mascara and eyeliner beyond easy repair. "Whoever it is, go away!" she snapped, cursing mentally at the hitch in her breath.

The door opened and Dana picked up her mug, fully prepared to throw it at whoever had _dared_ to come in. She set it down almost immediately when she saw Kia, one of the women who worked in the office. Dana hadn't spoken with the Hispanic lawyer more than once, and that was only to exchange the barest pleasantries.

"You look like you could use this," Kia said, and placed a cup of coffee and a muffin on Dana's desk. She smiled at Dana to show she wasn't kidding or about to do anything cruel. "Welcome to the office, by the way," she added.

Dana smiled weakly and took the lid off of the cup of coffee. Alright, maybe her coworkers weren't so bad. And apparently, she and Kia took their coffee the same way—black, two sugars. She gave Kia a teary smile and sipped the coffee. Kia stayed in her office for the rest of the day, doing paperwork and making snarky comments about some of the arresting officers.

As she packed up for the day, Dana reflected that maybe things weren't so bad. She swept the remains of her radio into the garbage bin and locked her office door behind her before leaving.

She bought three red roses on her way home, and took a detour to the graveyard where what had been left of Vince's body was interred.

"I love you Vince," Dana whispered, and placed the roses on the headstone. "I love you so much."

- o – o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Think Dana needs more than a cup of coffee? Drop a line and let me know!


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